Siding

They had started the siding before our last post, but I wanted to wait until more was done.  We went out tonight to take a few more pictures, and here it is.

Drywall

We went out to the house to check out the progress and found the drywall was completely hung.  there is still some taping and mudding needed, but it is all hung.

Foyer

Formal Living Room

Formal Dining Room

Family Room

Bonus Room (You get the small window with 3rd car)

Study

Master Bath

 First Floor Powder Room

 Upstairs Laundry

 Stairs

 Pantry

Week 8, Pre-drywall meeting

We met with our PM today for our pre drywall meeting.  It took about an hour.  I hadn't been to see the house since last week and the insulation was up on the walls.  We got our 2nd delivery of windows and they were installed.  Our new furnace came in and that was installed too!  Woo!

Talk about total paranoia now.  I was watching a white pick up truck, with lots of ladders, at it sat for five minutes outside our house.  I know he was getting ready to take something so I stared him down and he left.

Almost everything that we've requested to get changed/ fixed, Ryan has done so.  Still waiting to hear about what's going on with the roof.

Next step is an inspection from our town, then drywall will start Friday.  Quite possibly the siding will start this weekend!

Inspections and Thieves

It is official, the thievery has delayed our progress.  If you have read some of our previous posts you may have noticed that first 1/2 of our windows, and our sliding glass door were stolen.  Because the door was missing, someone stole the furnace that had already been installed the prior day.  Now Ryan can't do the siding or insulation without the windows, and we can't do energy star without the furnace.  I find is simply amazing that anyone could take something that they did not work for.  I imagine that somehow these assholes justify this because they are stealing from a builder and not a person, but think about how much more Ryan could afford to give us if they did not have to account for thieves.

On another note, we decided to hire a private inspector to inspect the home pre-drywall.  This went better than I hoped.  The inspector said it was built very well.  He sees a lot of builders cut corners, and this was not the case in our home.  He also said he would be happy if it were his home.  This is the best money I have spent so far, an  I plan to have him our again right before closing so he can fully test everything, and do a radon test.

Earlier in the week I had sent my PM at list of 17 items that I wanted to address/request.  So far everything has been fixed/changed or have received a promise or acceptable fix.  Although we are still waiting for the final verdict on the roof, I feel good that they are working on getting the shingle manufacturer to make it right.

Good and not so good

We went out to the house yesterday to check it out.  We found some good stuff and some bad stuff.

The Good

The brick was on the house and I really like it.  I was not expecting to have it around the porch slab, but there it was.  I think it is going to look really nice.

I was also pleasantly surprised to see the plumbing nearly done.  The shower basin and tub were also set in place.

I was also happy that the crew came out and cleaned the mold off of the trusses and coated them with something that will prevent mold in the future.  As soon as I mentioned mold it was taken very seriously by Ryan, and we appreciate that.  

The not so good

Still waiting on windows because 1/2 of them were stolen.  This is not Ryan fault, but it would be nice to have windows in our house.  We also noticed yesterday that the furnace was gone that was there Thursday.  I hope that did not get stolen as well.

The biggest source of disappointment is the roof.  First off the shingles are the wrong color, or at least not what we thought we were going to get.  Our neighbors have a nice brownish grey color and we have a solid grey.  It does not look nearly as nice as the neighbors houses.  I am hoping they replace it all.  In my opinion the roof also need to be redone for another reason.  It is awful.  The shingle installation does not look professional.  Ridge vents are not nearly long enough to cover the gap and there are just shingles over a 4 inch gap in the wood.  Not sure if you can tell from the picture below but the roof is cut wrong and that is the underneath side of shingle you see.  it is not the bottom of the ridge vent.

Now for above roof picture of what you are seeing there.  As you can tell from the picture below it is not right.  I am no roof inspector but this is obviously wrong and will leak for sure.

Other than these obvious issues I think the rest of the roof looks wavey and uneven.  This could be because the shingles have not settled, but you tell me if I am crazy.  It may be hard to tell but the roof is not flat at the edge.  Let me say our neighbors roofs look far more professional than our does, so I am sure it is not a practice of Ryan homes in general to do bad roofs.   My guess is that we just got a bad crew.

After looking at everyones very helpful blogs I came to the conclusion that we do not have enough ridge vent.  the wood on the roof was was obviously setup for entire length ridge vent similar to this one.  (notice the nearly full length ridge vents)

Here what ours looks like.  (You may have to zoom to se anything)

We also made a couple of requests to have some vents moved. and some bracing added so we could mount our TV.  I hope they do this for us.  I am thinking they will.

Our neighbor's roof (notice the dimensional look)

Our Zebra stripe roof (notice the vertical lines of alternating dark/light).  Anyone know what was wrong with the installation to look like this?

Week 6

Thanks to the SR, she let us know that are windows (what's left of them) are all in with the coil around them.  So we visited the house to see the garage doors, front door already installed.  

Our brick has also been delivered.  We visited the site with the family, twice, over the weekend and noticed
that a good portion of our windows has been stolen as well as the patio door overnight.  We notified our SR and she said it's normal for that to happen.  To me, it seems kinda silly that they left the pile of our windows and doors right next to the street uncovered.  You'd think Ryan Homes would at least attempt to conceal the product to cut down on the costs, time of reordering, and shipping.

It's definitely getting more and more exciting seeing so much being done.  I understand now how hard it is not going to the site everyday.  Only 54 more days until its all over and we have our first home.  K also called NVR and locked in our rate at 3.75.  If we waited another month we could've saved a couple hundred dollars on our mortgage.  It's a huge risk to take waiting another month hoping the rates don't rise.

Framed and wrapped

Drove out to the homesite this evening after the storms stopped and we were pleasantly surprised to see this.

It appears as though roofing is the next step.  I hope the rains hold off on monday so they can get the roof done in one day.  We did find something funning going on with the bonus room window.  Check it out for yourself.

That is the truss from the 3 car garage covering a portion of the window frame.  I emailed the PM and he said the plans did not get updated and we will still have a window here, but it will be shorter.  I would almost rather not have a window there period because I think it will look funny to have a larger window on the same wall with the smaller window.  What do you guys think?

Here are some more random pictures.

These guys work fast

I have read a lot of other blogs so I guess it should not surprise me how fast they can frame.  Tuesday morning we had a basement.  Last night, this is what we had.

And this is today.

I should be able to take better pictures now that the giant pile of dirt is gone from the from of the house. We will go out there this weekend and take a lot of pictures.

Framing has begun

I wanted to post something positive because I am feeling good today, and I don't want to post only when I am frustrated.  Monday afternoon the PM and SR called me to tell me how sorry they are for the delays in construction and the lack of communication at times.  The PM and the district manager called the framing company to tell them it was unacceptable to not show up 4 days in a row and not notify anyone.  I was told that they would be there first thing in the morning on Tuesday, and guess what.... They were.  They are still behind schedule, but the framing company is going to try to make it all up in the framing stage by working weekends.  I have not been to the site since they started, because I am not feeling well, but the SR sent me a picture to help us out.